I cost my married lovers £3m: Does Apprentice husband-stealer Katie Hopkins have any REAL regrets?

Kate Hopkins is pottering around her kitchen with her three young children, working her way contentedly through the daily domestic routine and reeling off a list as she goes.

'There was the £1 million family home, the London flat which fetched another £500,000 .. . a couple of pension plans ... the people carrier and three other cars . . . boarding school education adding up to half a million pounds . . . not to mention the gym memberships.'

It sounds as if she is proudly listing the trappings of her own achievements as a successful businesswoman and former The Apprentice candidate. In fact, she's reeling off the cost of her selfish and infamous love life to the married men who have crossed her path.

Man-eater: Kate Hopkins has boasted of affairs with three married men

There have, she admits, been affairs with three such men, as well as a broken marriage of her own.

'Aside from all those things which those men lost or had to pay for, there was also the cost of two barristers on retainers - including Prince Charles's lawyer Fiona Shackleton - because their affairs with me led to costly divorces.'

She pauses, before adding: 'It's only the other day that I started to think about all of these financial consequences. Up until then, I don't think I had felt much remorse. At the time I had the affairs, I was in love and interested only in my own happiness.

'But once I listed everything and saw the figures stacking up, I felt guilty about the poor men with whom I had affairs.

Share this article

'I inflicted pain on others. It was only once I actually became a mother that I started to really think about the children involved and, yes, I did feel bad.

'I look at my own life now, as a mother-of-three with a partner I love, and I know I am happier than I've ever been. But it's been at a tremendous emotional and financial cost.

'I estimate that it has cost up to £3 million in divorce costs and lost assets for the men involved with me. That's how much has been lost for me finally to achieve this happiness.'

Caught on camera: Katie cavorting in a field with married lover Mark Cross

Perhaps if Katie had thought more about the devastating (many would say inevitable) fallout before embarking on her series of affairs, her own happiness would not have come at such an appalling price to others. But then that's never really been her style.

When this self-styled 'Alpha Female' launched her bid for fame as a contestant on The Apprentice in 2007 - which returned for a new series last night - she listed 'husband stealing' on her CV, and boasted of affairs with three married men.

They included millionaire businessman Damian McKinney, her former boss, whose 19-year marriage was destroyed by their affair. McKinney left his wife Tina and their three children to be with Katie. (His teenage daughter later suffered from anorexia as a result of the marriage break-up.)

McKinney married Katie in 2004, shortly after the birth of their first daughter. But he left her a year later, when their second child was just one day old - ironically, after an affair with another woman.

Single once more, Katie started a relationship with another married man, former work colleague Paul Collin. His three-year marriage collapsed shortly afterwards, but Katie maintains he was already separated from his wife when they started to date. And even while The Apprentice was being aired (Katie won a place in the final, but withdrew when challenged by Sir Alan Sugar about her willingness, if she won, to relocate her children), she was photographed enjoying an al fresco romp with yet another married man, Mark Cross.

Katie, in white, reached the final of The Apprentice before pulling out

He left his wife, Ruth, to live with Katie and the couple's first child, Max, was born last year. But his two stepsons - whom he had raised after the death of their father - no longer have any contact with him.

So, three children sired by two men and five children deprived of a nuclear family because their fathers were seduced by the shameless Miss Hopkins.

Today, Katie admits that she is for the first time counting the financial cost of those wrecked marriages, saying with a staggering lack of self-awareness: 'Once you've added it all up, you ask yourself why people don't just go to marriage guidance counsellors. It's far cheaper.'

Raised in Devon, the daughter of an engineer and a housewife, Katie, 33, went to private school and studied economics at Exeter University. She passed through the military academy at Sandhurst and, after three years in the Army, launched herself on the world of business.

She also launched herself on her new boss, managing director Damian McKinney, who was married with three children. Later, his wife Tina recalled visiting their London flat and finding not only the mistress's clothes, but a note where Katie had systematically listed the 'pros' and 'cons' of an affair with Damian.

Under pros were his flat in New York and his job as company director. Under cons was the fact he had three children. Damian left his wife, but his young blonde lover had no regrets.

'It was the most exciting time of my life. I was in love, and when you are in love you don't think about anyone else who might have been hurt,' says Katie.

'Damian and I went to live in New York, which meant that we didn't have an awkward period of "sharedness" with his wife. In fact, I can't recall at which point he actually left his wife.

'But I remember being utterly caught up in the thrill and romance of it all. I felt no real sense of guilt at that time. I was just in love.'

But Damian's subsequent divorce was costly.

Katie says: 'It's quite right that the children from his first marriage were put first. His £1million home went to his wife, he signed away the two family cars and he also had to sell the flat in London, which was worth about £500,000.

'Damian's wife had not worked, so he was required by the courts to keep her maintained in the comfort and style she was used to. He paid for her gym membership, and private school education for the children, which was around £60,000 a year.

'He hired a barrister and solicitor at a cost of thousands of pounds, and he went for the best - Prince Charles's divorce lawyer, Fiona Shackleton.

'In the end, the cost of his divorce was staggering. It stripped him of his assets, and left him with just his large salary.

'But he wanted to do the right thing for his family, and we had found happiness, even at a huge price. Or so I thought.'

Their first child, India, was born in June 2004, and three months later they were married in front of their families and friends. Their second daughter, Poppy, was born on August 21, 2005 - and just one day later, Damian left for another woman.

Katie says: 'I knew from seven months into the pregnancy that something was going on, but I kept it to myself. I've always believed that you can heal a rift by sorting things out privately.

'I thought maybe things would be OK, and I wanted Poppy to have her father there when she was born.

How did I know he was having an affair? Probably woman's intuition. Partly because certain arrangements were strange. After all, I'd once been the mistress myself. I knew all the signs.' It was certainly a case of the biter bit - and in the most brutal fashion.

'I hoped that I might be able to save the marriage, but when Poppy was just one day old, Damian left. The impact of that was beyond anything I have ever known.

'I had a newborn baby, a 13- month-old toddler and whenever I took them to the park, there were all these happy couples with children. Or, worse still, dads on their own pushing prams.

'It was so hard, but I couldn't feel sorry for myself, could I? I refused to wallow in self-pity because I had broken up a marriage myself and now someone else had done it to me.

'I thought: "You get what you give. If you dish it out to someone else, expect to take it back."

'It was almost as if I was going through this because my affair with Damian had wrecked his first marriage. Now it was my turn to be alone. I've always had a feeling that what goes around, comes around.

'I felt mortified for my poor parents, who had given me a traditional Cornish wedding. I missed all the friends we had shared as a married couple. I hated the loss of shared history - the box of photographs that you can't face looking back at because they are part of the old life you had together.

'It was a tough time - but again I am not complaining. I had been a mistress; now I was a spurned wife. All I could do was divorce Damian and get on with raising my children alone. 'From Damian's point of view, our divorce was far less costly than his first one. All I wanted was a settlement for our children, and for their schooling to be paid for.

'I had always worked for a living, so our overall settlement was far lower. We didn't have a joint home because Damian had moved into my home.'

However, the experience of seeing her own marriage torn apart by another woman did not stop the ambitious Miss Hopkins from launching into yet another affair with a married man. This time it was Paul Collin, a former work colleague.

'This affair was different because he was living apart from his wife when we met,' she says.

'His marriage had already collapsed, and they didn't divorce as a result of our affair.'

So, that's all right then.

Within two years, Katie had built a new life, earning £60,000 a year as a successful brand consultant.

Then, in 2007, she entered The Apprentice, describing herself as an 'Alpha female' and listing 'husband-stealing' on her CV - with a staggering contempt for the children whose homes had been shattered by her selfishness.

During the making of the TV series, she boasted of affairs with three married men, rated herself 'ten out of ten' in bed and was reported to have enjoyed a fling with fellow contestant Paul Callaghan, an unmarried former Army lieutenant (which she denies).

In the end, Katie reached the final, before withdrawing after a confrontation with Sir Alan Sugar over her commitment and willingness to relocate her family from Exeter to London.

But by the time the show had aired, Katie had moved on already - to another married man. She was pictured cavorting half-naked in a field with a colleague, Mark Cross. When the photographs made headline news, Mark was still with his wife Ruth.

With the affair exposed in the most tawdry fashion, he moved in with Katie - and yet another expensive divorce was triggered. Not that Katie is concerning herself too much with the feelings of the wives whose husbands she so blithely stole.

'While The Apprentice was being aired, Mark moved in with me and my daughters,' she says.

'The financial cost of the divorce that followed was high. Mark, like Damian, wanted to do the right thing for his former wife. He was a successful graphic designer, who had once worked for Saatchi, but he walked away with just one-sixth of the assets from the marriage.

'It cost him at least £750,000, and he walked away from a lavish lifestyle.

'He and his wife had a nice four-bedroom house, with a lot of land attached to it. Mark left his beloved art collection, some lovely furniture and a very nice car. He willingly left it all behind. 'Sadly, his two stepsons didn't want any more to do with him.

Their father had died of cancer and they had always been so close to him - but they understandably took their mother's side in the divorce.'

But why, having experienced at first-hand the wretched heartache of her own marriage being ended by an affair, did Katie happily take yet another man from his wife?

'I knew that he was married - but I was in love, and that was all-consuming for me,' she says.

'From the moment I met Mark, I had a feeling that we were supposed to be together. When you've found that special someone, you don't sit back and wonder about the consequences of getting together.

'We fell in love. I caused a lot of pain in the process, though - and it's only now that I am finally happy, settled and contented that I'm beginning to realise exactly how financially and emotionally devastating my affairs have been in the past.'

Katie and Mark's first child, Max, was born in November 2008, and the couple, who live in Katie's £450,000 Exeter townhouse, plan to marry.

'Despite everything, I still have this image of a mother and a father raising their children within marriage,' says Katie.

'Believe it or not, I respect marriage and still want to be married.

'It's only now, when I'm happier than I've ever been before, that I've really started to think about the unhappiness I've caused in the past.

'I feel sorry for those men who lost all their assets, after years of hard work, because their flings with me led to divorces. 'I feel sorry for their wives. I know that Tina, Damian's first wife, is sitting in a million-pound house and enjoying a life of comfort - but I also know she'd swap everything to have her marriage back again.

'I can't change things, and I don't know what would have happened to their marriages if I hadn't come along. After all, you never know what goes on behind closed doors.

'But I do know my happiness has come at a huge cost. And I accept that, along the way, other people have paid the price.'

Share or comment on this article:

I cost my married lovers £3m: Does Apprentice husband-stealer Katie Hopkins have any REAL regrets?